Editor's note: This story was first published in the Modesto Bee on March 9, 2006.
Carol Tomlinson-Keasey, who has been chancellor at the University of California at Merced since 1999 -- before the school was built -- announced Wednesday she is resigning her position as of Aug. 31.
"These have been very intense, demanding years in which family priorities move down the list, sometimes too far," she said during a news conference on campus Wednesday. Though she was treated a few years ago for breast cancer, she said she is in good health. She said she's looking forward to spending more time with her husband, Blake Keasey, and her children and grandchildren.
But Tomlinson-Keasey won't leave UC Merced, to which she said she is "committed, heart and soul." She'll take a sabbatical, during which she plans to work with Jane Lawrence, vice chancellor for student affairs, and Karen Merritt, director of academic planning for the UC Office of the President, on a book chronicling what it took to open the first new UC campus in 40 years.
That effort included a contentious environmental approval process and shifting of the site after environmental groups sued to stop construction because of threats the project posed to endangered species.
Bob Rucker, then-state Sen. Dick Monteith's chief of staff, worked with the university through the process.
"We kept running up against roadblocks and she kept figuring out ways to move it forward," he said Wednesday. "If it wasn't for her, there wouldn't be a UC Merced and I'm really sad to hear that she's leaving."
Rep. Dennis Cardoza, D-Merced, agreed. "Nobody will ever know the battles we went through to make this work," he said. Of her resignation, he said, "It's simply a tragedy. No one will miss her more than I."
After she finishes her book, Tomlinson-Keasey plans to return to the campus as a professor in fall 2007, teaching psychology.
Students and many staff members found out about the chancellor's departure through a campuswide message sent about the same time she made her public announcement Wednesday.
"I guess it will bring a lot of changes," said Uday Bali, 19, of Modesto. He began last fall with the inaugural class, and said he has enjoyed his first year at UC Merced even more than he expected. "She said she's leaving to spend time with her family, and I respect that."
Gary Phelps, 18, of Merced, said the chancellor's announcement was "100 percent unexpected."
However, he wasn't upset, and said he's comfortable with the school.
"I think she has built a foundation here," Phelps said. "She has a lot of people's respect. She has done great things and will continue doing great things."
SHE RAN THE SCHOOL BEFORE IT HAD A HOME
Tomlinson-Keasey is the UC's first female founding chancellor. She oversaw the newest campus from site searches that included more than 80 locations through construction and the hiring of faculty and staff, and to what she called her proudest moment: opening day last year.
Over Labor Day weekend, the campus welcomed its first 900 students, more than 600 of whom took up residence in its dorms. The chancellor said last summer she was most excited about seeing students filling the classrooms, using the library and walking the halls.
And it's the people she'll miss most when she leaves her job, she said Wednesday.
"We have a great team," Tomlinson-Keasey said. "I know the faculty because I hired them. A chancellor coming in will not know them the way I do." She praised faculty, staff and students, whom she called vibrant, interested and interesting, smart and committed.
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